It’s a Summer-Movie ‘Splosion!
Tom, Cameron, Angie and Leo return to the multiplex. But is there still pop in their corn?
Sara Vilkomerson
Iron Man Lives Again!
When Iron Man came out in 2008, critics and audiences pretty much lost their damn minds over it. And why not? The film was exquisitely cast—everyone had already previously acknowledged just how fantastic an actor Robert Downey Jr. is, but watching him embody the brilliant, witty and debauched Tony Stark, one had to agree that Read More
Movies: The Lady Auteur
April may be the cruelest month for some, but in Hollywood-land, it’s the start of the big-big blockbuster season that will keep theaters stocked up on exploding 3-D robots, superheroes and star-studded comedies through September. But on April 30, nestled amid clashing titans and ass-kicking comic-book characters, comes a much smaller movie that would be Read More
Single White Female
CHLOE
Running time 99 minutes
Written by Erin Cressida Wilson
Directed by Atom Egoyan
Starring Julianne Moore, Amanda Seyfried, Liam Neeson
Sheesh. When will people learn? Under the ironclad laws decreed by movieland, we know that cheating on a spouse leads to nothing but trouble (Fatal Attraction); snooping on a suspected philanderer will Read More
I Love Rock ‘n’ Roll
THE RUNAWAYS
RUNNING TIME 109 minutes
WRITTEN AND DIRECTED bY
Floria Sigismondi
STARRING Dakota Fanning,
Kristen Stewart, Michael Shannon
2 Eyeballs out of 4
Sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll—it’s fun, isn’t it? As long as there is music to be cranked up on the stereo, so will it always be Read More
Stiller Waters Run Deep
GREENBERG
RUNNING TIME 107 minutes
WRITTEN AND DIRECTED BY Noah Baumbach
STARRING Ben Stiller, Greta Gerwig, Rhys Ifans
3 Eyeballs out of 4
When Noah Baumbach’s wonderful (and still totally underappreciated) The Squid and the Whale came out in 2006, it quickly sent a wide swath of New York’s male population spiraling Read More
Welcome to the Jungle
You really can’t quibble with The Pacific‘s pedigree: The epic 10-part miniseries, which will air on consecutive Sunday evenings on HBO beginning March 15, comes from Tom Hanks, Steven Spielberg and Gary Goetzman, the same producing team that did the similarly themed 2001 miniseries Band of Brothers (Mr. Hanks and Mr. Goetzman also teamed up Read More
Snoozy Oscar-fest Ends Big With Bigelow!
Well, so that happened! Was it just us or were these just the most tediously boring Oscars in ages? And who should we blame? Maybe we should start with the very strange stage design, which we’re guessing was intended to be a nod to old Hollywood glamour, but felt more like an early-’70s Read More
Law & Disorder
Brooklyn’s Finest
Running time 140 minutes
Written by Michael C. Martin
Directed by Antoine Fuqua
Starring Richard Gere, Don Cheadle, Ethan Hawke, Wesley Snipes
2.5 Eyeballs out of 4
The opening scene of Brooklyn’s Finest features a conversation between a maybe crooked cop and a definitely crooked career criminal about the Read More
21st Century Blues
The Ask
By Sam Lipsyte
Farrar, Straus and Giroux,
304 pages, $25
Near the end of Sam Lipsyte’s wonderful fourth novel, The Ask, protagonist Milo Burke considers sending out résumés in a terrible (and familiar) economy. “You could still get lucky,” he says. “Couldn’t you?”
He doesn’t give an answer. Certainly Read More
